Saturday, May 28, 2011

Pirates of the Caribbean: Better Than Everyone Says It Is

This review is real simple. If you didn't like the last two Pirate movies, you will loathe this one. If you are like me, who actually liked the last two you won't be that disappointed in this one. Is it as good? No. But I have seen far worse films this week, cough cough Winter's Bone, hack wheeze.

The plot centers around Captain Jack Sparrow as he is trying to find the fountain of Youth. Captured by the Brits, he is highjacked into helped them along with Barbosa, Blackbeard and his daughter spicily played by Penelope Cruz. Jack is further hindered by the Spaniards who want it for themselves, zombies, mermaids and countless British guards who want Sparrow's head. The screenplay is fun and jovial and never wears out its welcome.

The problems however have to do with a lazy script that has plot momentum move along with little explanation or logic. Sparrow's father shows up at an opportune moment merely as a plot device and not as a necessary element. Worse, the entire mermaid storyline is beyond ridiculous with characters performing actions without reason, story threads left hanging (whatever happened to the priest after being dragged away by a friendly mermaid. We never find out), and generally just rampant stupidity that could have all been explained with a few more lines of dialogue.

But other than that the film is a real hoot. As long as you like pirate movies.

3 and 1/2 stars out of 5

Wednesday, May 18, 2011

Bridesmaids: Funnier Than It Should Have Been

I know as a guy I am supposed to be genetically predispositioned to hate chick flicks, romantic comedies and period piece dramas. However, as a lover of cinema of all types, I like these types of movies when they are done well. And my God, have they NOT been good as of late. Talking with their target audience of females of various ages I can tell they are no happier than I've been these past few years. Films like Bride Wars, the Wedding Planner and pretty much anything staring either J-Lo or Kate Hudson has been awful, awful, awful. They make women seem beyond neurotic which can't be good for society.

Finally, we get not only a good romantic comedy about women but one that actually has real people in it, not some Hollywood stereotype that is almost blackface in it's misogynist state. Kristen Wiig is fantastic as Annie, a woman who's life is going nowhere. She's sleeping with a true cadd, played to the hilt by an uncredited John Hamm, lost her business and is sharing an apartment played by a creepy brother and sister pair (Matt Lucas and Rebel Wilson) who almost deserve their own spinoff film. In the midst of all of this her best friend from childhood, Lilian (Maya Rudolph), is getting married, devastating Annie. The movie captures the weirdness of weddings by throwing radically different women together as bridesmaids and expecting their to be no friction. Annie meets newlywed Becca (Ellie Kemper of the Office),the sick of marriage, Rita (Wendi McLendon-Covey from Reno 911), the hypersexual, devil may care, overweight Megan (brilliantly played by Mike and Molly's Mellisa McCarthy) and the uber-perfect foil, Helen (Rose Byrne in her hundredth film this year. It seems every film as of late has Byrne or Natalie Portman in it.).

As Annie's life spirals out of control she inadvertently sabotages everything about the pre wedding planning that a maid of honor is supposed to do, hurt that not only is she losing her best friend to a new marriage but is rapidly being pushed out by the richer, smarter, more beautiful Helen. Annie is very damaged by her past and it shows in both funny and sad moments. When she meets the very nice Irish cop, Rhodes (Chris O'Dowd), Annie is so self destructive that she can't recognize a good thing when it literally hits her in the face.

This is a great movie, maybe a little over long, but that's par for the course for a Judd Aptow film. This is one of the funniest pictures I have seen this year, just behind the awesome PAUL. If your looking for a romantic comedy that won't make you slit your wrists half way through, this is the one. It's about time.

4 out of five stars

Friday, May 13, 2011

The Tourist: Waterworld Syndrome Strikes Again

Every now and then comes along a film that tries very hard to overachieve. Budget gets too high, A-list stars are signed, a top director comes aboard. That's what happened with Waterworld. It was supposed to be a low budget, B- movie, produced by Roger Corman, King of the B Film. Then someone got into their head that this film was going to be huge if they just thought bigger. Soon it ballooned into a 200 million dollar beast with sets that sank to the bottom of the Pacific, weather problems, and a feud between Kevin Costner and director Kevin Reynolds that was never fully resolved and who's subsequent careers went with the sunken set pieces. If they had stayed small, it might have worked. It certainly would have been a better film. Thus the Waterworld Syndrome.

Enter the Tourist with exactly the same problem. This was not a big budget, A list star film. Angelina Jolie plays the least convincing covert spy ever with Johnny Depp not far behind as a math teacher, who have as much chemistry together as oil and water. Really, who wouldn't notice Angelina Jolie anywhere. Not a good asset for a spy. Through a series of contrived and pointless encounters, Depp and Jolie are on a non-madcap race against time for a Mcguffin that once materialized is the stupidest ending ever. I won't ruin it here but suffice to say most will groan and the rest will say "wait, what" and a select few will do both. In true Hollywood fashion they fall in love with each other in a day when most people would still be trying to figure out why the hell someone as hot as Jolie was even talking to you.

The movie is basically a vignette of beautiful location shots. One scene has Depp on a Venetian balcony with the Bridge of Sighs in the distance. It's breathtaking. Everything else, not so much.

The worst part was I was thinking that this film should have been a)a comedy, b)starring B or even C list actors, c) directed by some one else. Apparently I wasn't the only one. Tom Cruise was set to star in this, then Sam Worthington, who left over "creative differences," to finally Johnny Depp. Jolie was supposed to be Charlize Theron and the director changed several times, even the current one who quit and came back. No one wanted to make this film. Shocker. It was all still too big. Cut the budget to 30-40 million, hire Kevin James and Kristen Wiig to star and make it funny. Trust me, it would have been far better than this dull mess.

one star out of 5

Wednesday, May 11, 2011

GRIM REAPER RETURNS TO SLAUGHTER FOX NETWORK

A bloodbath occured today at the Fox television channel as almost all of its new shows over the past two years were axed yesterday. Personal favorites Lie to Me, Breaking In and, Damn it, Human Target were all axed along with the not too surprising Chicago Hope and Running Wilde which was all but dead anyway. How Bob's Burgers made it back it anybody's guess.

New shows such as the JJ Abrams Alcatraz, Terra Nova (dinosaurs and Steven Spielberg, what's not to like), and Finder, the Bones spin off all have promise. Two other shows are also rumored to be on the pick up list, more as it comes in.

Not on the list is Locke and Key, a graphic novel that may be shopped to another network. The Reaper will be busy these next few weeks. Stay tuned for who gets it next.

Monday, May 9, 2011

THOR: MARVEL STRIKES AGAIN

Any reader of these articles will see a love for marvel comics as that was what I read and collected growing up. I loved Spider Man, Iron Man, The Avengers and the X-Men with an occasional glance at Hulk, Fantastic Four and the like. Thor not so much. Nothing against him but I had other acts to follow. However I was still aware of some of his past and was curious to see how they handled his big screen make over. All I can say is WOW great job.

Relative new comer Chris Helmsworth is perfect as the God of Thunder. I am the furthest thing from gay but Damn that man is hot! Women were actually getting pregnant at the mere sight of him on the big screen his looks were so powerful. He WAS Thor. For the men we had Natalie Portman and Kat Dennings to stare at for two hours. In other words, for eye candy alone, this film scores a ten.

The plot is nothing new but well directed by Kenneth Branaugh, not making any of the mistakes he made during his filming of Frankenstein. Thor gets haughty and Anthony Hopkins' Odin banishes him to Earth for punishment. Once there, he is taught humanity and humility by Portman and her mentor Erik (Stellen Skarsgard), scientists studying atmospheric anomalies which is how they literally run into Thor. Kat Denninds plays the young assistant Darcy mostly as comic relief. Meanwhile, Loki assumes the throne of Asgard and all things go to hell as Thor must battle back his godhood to save his home and Earth.

The special effects are fantastic but once again, the 3-D is unnecessary and by no means something you have to see it as unless, like me, you didn't have a choice. Could the theaters have at least one showing running the 2-D version please so I don't have shell out the price of a lobster dinner to see a movie?

The film is action packed, funny and well worth going to see even in the kind of crappy 3-D (P.S.-Drive Angry had excellent 3-D so it is possible to do). A must see on the big screen.

4 stars out of 5

Friday, May 6, 2011

Little Fockers: Focking Awful

If a million monkeys typed a million years on a million typewriters, they would still get a better screenplay than this drek. Certain to appear on my worst of the year list, this waste of film wastes a plethora of solid talent by forcing them to be not funny for an hour and a half. A very long hour and a half I might add.

The plot is typical sitcom fodder where De Nero's Jack is suffering from chest pains so he decides to have Stiller's Greg be the head of the family should anything happen to him. Never mind that in the previous two movies, Jack has a son who is conveniently forgotten about, a prospect I wish I could do as well. The rest of the film is Jack terrorizing his son in law to such an extent that stalking laws were certainly violated as much as my eyeballs were. Owen Wilson, Blythe Danner, Teri Polo and Barabra Streisand are all adequate though rarely funny. Harvey Keitel is in this in a glorified cameo that made little sense and not necessary. Not exactly the Taxi Driver reunion we all wanted. Worst of the bunch is the still hot Jessica Alba who is horribly miscast as a love foil for Greg. Not entirely her fault as her part is badly written but a different actress might have been much better.

The script is piss poor as if they had watched a Three's Company marathon and said let's duplicate the worst jokes of the series. Everything here is sitcomy awful and no one will not see the jokes coming a mile away. It isn't helped by the leaden directing by Paul Weitz, who with his brother Chris, are becoming two unwatchable talents to avoid at all costs. His brother Chris is doing the craptastic looking A Better Life, about illegal aliens working in the US. That'll play well in Peoria (add sarcasm here). Both SUCK as directors and neither has done anything worth watching since the first American Pie. How do these idiots keep getting work when their movies aren't very good? But more important to the bean counters in Hollywood, their movies don't make any money. Who hires people who movies fail consistently? MBAtards who run Lalaland, that's who. This is why movies suck so bad today, because toadies like this keep getting hired to do equally lousy work. STOP HIRING THE WEITZ BROTHERS ALREADY. THEY SUUUUUUCCCCCCKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKK.

There are some funny parts to the movie mostly off the fact that the cast is quite good. De Nero scores the most laughs followed closely by Jinxie the cat. When your upstaged by an animal look out. Oddly, the funniest moments are all at the end of the picture, by which most will have turned off by. The YouTube remix of Greg's speech at a Big Pharma convention is hilarious. Too bad you have to suffer through an hour and a half of nut kicking pain to get to it.

one star out of 5